Mobile TV gets thumbs up

Participants in pan-European trials of mobile television say they would gladly sign up for such a service and many would be prepared to pay for mobile TV.

These were some of the findings from a number of mobile phone pilot schemes run by Nokia in Finland, England, France and Spain. Each of the pilots involved a mobile operator and a TV content provider, which transmitted live digital TV to a Nokia 7710 handset.

Nearly 60 per cent of Finnish respondents thought the service would be very popular. Eight-three per cent of English respondents were happy with the service, compared to 75 per cent in Spain. Seventy-three per cent of the respondents in France said they would recommend the service to others. Although only 40 per cent of Finnish respondents were prepared to pay for the service, a clear majority of respondents from England, France and Spain were prepared to pay.

"These pilots are a vital component of the development of broadcast mobile TV, demonstrating consumer demand and business models for viable commercial services," Nokia senior vice president Ilkka Raiskinen said in a statement. "These pilots have proven to be very useful for all the different players in the mobile TV industry."

The most popular pricing model to emerge from the study is a monthly subscription for a package of channels. In the Helsinki pilot, half of those that took part thought €10 per month was a reasonable price to pay, while in France, 68 per cent were willing to pay &eur;7 per month for mobile TV services.

The studies also revealed a variation in the time people would be most interested in watching programmes on their handsets.

English viewers were most inclined to watch at midday, suggesting that viewers are enjoying their favourite TV content while on their lunch break. In Spain people were most inclined to watch TV during the early evening. In France, participants spread their viewing periods evenly between early evening, lunchtime and mid-evening.

The most popular types of content were news, sports, music, soaps and documentaries.